Garden Friday

Hey there and welcome to Garden Friday!

I have recently  
                           fallen 
                                      in 
                                                love...
with this pink dogwood tree in our front yard.
It is a symbol of the South and I'm thinking I need a few more,
just so we have a proper Southern Homestead!

 To my astonishment,
our peach trees have fruit on them.
These poor babies have been fairly neglected by previous owners,
but they are still trying to do what they are intended to do.

I'm not sure that I can nurse these trees back to health,
they are in pretty bad shape,
but this will be the first season that I can monitor their progress.
Fingers crossed!

The straw bales have not germinated one thing that was planted.
Pretty disappointing, I must say,
but we carry on anyway.
The transplanted kale seems to be happy there,
and this week we were able to transplant some lettuces that had been sown from seed.

There are watermelon and canteloupe seedlings ready to transplant,
and I'm thinking of adding them to the two ends of the bales
so that they can roam at will.

We had an unexpected cold snap and it looks like the kale didn't much appreciate it.
I took a sampling of both the kale and lettuce growing in the bales
and they tasted mighty fine.

The sugar snap peas are making slow progress up the pots.
I'm thinking I may have started these a bit too late to get much of a harvest.
I recently heard about a variety that only gets to 4 feet, so doesn't need trellising,
and that seems like a great alternative!

The potato towers are doing nicely.
The shoots are growing up out of the straw,
so I covered them with some leaves
 to protect them from the cold that we are expecting tonight.
Hopefully, this will be the last of the cold weather for a while. 
(Haven't I said that before?)

Tomatoes and melons are awaiting their turn to be transplanted.
I'll be fashioning tomato supports for the first time this year.
It's a combination tomato cage and stake gizmo
that I learned about on one of my favorite blogs, Old World Gardens.

 The deck continues to host a variety of spring and summer crops,
as well as a few surprises.
We seeded our loofha and some pigeon peas in cell packs.
I was also gifted with some cucumber starts
that I plan to put in a pot over the weekend.
I see pickles in our future!

Since I had some doubt about the viability of the snap peas and green beans,
I decided to try sprouting them in bags.
If these germinate, they'll be added to the container garden.

 The azaleas continue to amaze us with so many blooms!

Here are a few new acquisitions I picked up at a local nursery.
Two of these beauties are familiar to me,
as we had them in our Florida garden.
I'm hoping to get them installed as soon as this last cold snap passes us by.
I'll be posting about our visit to Mike's nursery next week.

We were thrilled to be visited by hummers this week.
No sooner had we hung up the feeder,
when one very persistent hummingbird made himself right at home.
You can read how we make our own hummingbird nectar here.

 It seems that spring is hesitant to stick around.
The weather has been gorgeous and then a sudden cold snap overnight
makes us think that winter will never bid us adieu.

Nonetheless, we are grateful for living a seasonal life.
C'mon spring, we're ready for you!

Summer Hummer Haven

With autumn fast approaching,
we wanted to share one of the wonderful discoveries 
of our first summer here in NC.

A hummingbird feeder was left here by the previous owners.
We put it to the side and figured we would end up donating it.
I knew taking care of hummingbird feeders would be more work,
with having to mix up the nectar and regularly cleaning the feeders out.
Another job on my chore list isn't what I was looking for.

 After researching and finding out how little effort was needed,
we decided to give it a go.
Are we glad we did!
We are able to enjoy hummers all day long
with the feeder hung right in front of our office window.
I haven't yet mastered capturing these fascinating creatures in pictures,
but I will be able to hone those skills since they are such frequent visitors.

Once a week, we mix up the nectar solution
(only homemade would do!)
and flush the feeder with water before refilling.
It is recommended that the feeder be cleaned once a month
with a diluted bleach solution.


Nectar Recipe
1 part white sugar
4 parts water

We added 1/4 C of white, granulated sugar
to a cup of tap water and brought it to the boil.
After cooling the solution until it was room temperature,
we refilled the feeder.
It's not necessary to use distilled water
or organic sugar.
In fact, we've read that using anything but these two simple ingredients
can do more harm than good.

Since the nectar is only a supplement to their diet,
hummers will have plenty to eat should you run out of the solution.
They also love to eat flying insects
and the nectar naturally occurring in many flowering plants.
As we plan our spring garden,
we will be adding many more of these type of flowers,
so that we can support the hummers (and other pollinators) in our area.

We are so thankful that these critters choose to visit us each day.
They are a magical element of summer .